The numbers glowed in the holographic display, a silent, profound testament to the revolution that had occurred in the last twenty-four hours.
Offshore Account Balance: €2,500.00 Equivalent in Indian Rupees: ₹225,000+
Arjun stared at the figure. Two hundred and twenty-five thousand rupees. It was an unimaginable sum. More than five months of his old salary, earned in less than a day from two objects that had cost him nothing but System Points and ambient dust. The paralyzing anxiety of his bank account hovering near zero was gone, replaced by a cool, calculating calm.
He was rich. Not "oligarch" rich, but "breathing" rich. The kind of rich that meant he could walk into a store and buy a carton of milk without doing mental math. The kind of rich that meant never having to walk five kilometers in worn-out shoes again.
A notification from Gyan shimmered into view, breaking his reverie.
["Passive System Point Regeneration Complete. Current SP: 10/10."]
The energy was back. The capital was there. The equation had finally, definitively shifted. It was no longer about survival. It was about investment. And the most logical, most critical investment was staring him in the face.
Himself.
His eyes drifted to his Status screen, still displayed in the air.
Strength (STR): 4 (Below Average) Stamina (STA):3 (Poor) Vitality (VIT):4 (Below Average)
These numbers were a liability. They were the statistics of a victim. Of someone who could be pushed around, who got sick, who tired easily. In the hidden world Gyan was beginning to uncover, and in the world of power he was about to step into, such weakness was a beacon for predators.
He needed a foundation. A body and mind that could withstand what was to come.
"Gyan," he said, his voice steady with newfound purpose. "I'm going to upgrade my physical attributes. Monitor my vitals. Alert me to any anomalies."
"Acknowledged. All biometric sensors are active and monitoring. Proceed when ready."
Arjun took a deep breath, centering himself on his mattress. He focused inward, pulling up the Upgrade function and selecting himself as the target. The list of attributes appeared. The cost was still steep: 10 SP per point.
He started with Stamina. It was his lowest stat, the root of his constant fatigue. The ability to endure, to keep going—it felt like the most fundamental need.
Upgrade Stamina by one point, he commanded.
["Upgrade Target: User (Stamina). Cost: 10 SP. Proceed? Y/N"]
Y.
The effect was not gentle.
It was as if a live wire had been jabbed into his spine. A jolt of raw, coursing energy flooded his system. His muscles seized for a moment, not in pain, but in a profound, shocking surge of power. He gasped, his back arching off the mattress. The deep, bone-level weariness that had been his constant companion for years evaporated, burned away in an instant. It felt like he had just woken from the most restful ten-hour sleep of his life, infused with the energy to run a marathon.
The sensation faded after a few seconds, leaving him panting but exhilarated. His SP dropped to 0. He felt… capable.
But it wasn't enough. He was still weak. Still fragile.
He waited, the minutes stretching, watching his SP bar refill with agonizing slowness. 1… 2… 3… This was the new grind. Not for rupees, but for the energy to reshape his very being.
The moment it hit 10 again, he moved.
Upgrade Strength by one point.
Y.
This time, the sensation was a deep, burning heat that spread through his muscles and bones. It was a forge-fire inside him. He felt his frame tighten, his previously soft arms gaining a subtle, hard definition. A faint, cracking sound echoed from his joints as they realigned themselves to a more perfect, stronger configuration. He clenched his fist. The power there was new, palpable. He could feel the potential in his grip.
Another point of Stamina. Another wave of electric endurance. He felt like he could hold his breath for minutes.
Another point of Strength. The heat was more intense this time, a pleasurable burn of creation. The veins on his forearms stood out in stark relief. He was no longer just a programmer; he was starting to look like an athlete.
He was burning through his SP, waiting for the regeneration, then burning through it again. It was a addictive, euphoric cycle. With each upgrade, he felt less like the ghost of Arjun Mishra and more like… someone new.
He upgraded Vitality. A wave of profound wellness washed over him. His skin, previously pale and slightly sallow, gained a healthy glow. His eyesight, already decent, sharpened until he could see the individual motes of dust dancing in the sunbeams cutting through his window. His hearing picked up the faint hum of Gyan's internal processes. His immune system felt like an impenetrable fortress. He knew, with absolute certainty, he would never catch a common cold again.
He was so engrossed in his self-sculpting that he almost missed Gyan's calm interjection.
"Arjun, my continuous analysis of global data traffic has uncovered anomalous patterns."
Arjun blinked, pulling his focus from the intense physical sensations. "What kind of patterns?"
"Following the energy surge from your lightning strike incident, there has been a 400% increase in encrypted data packets originating from Lucknow, all routed to a single, heavily fortified server cluster registered to a shell corporation. This corporation is a subsidiary of OmniCorp International."
A cold trickle of apprehension ran down his spine, a stark contrast to the heat of his upgrades. "OmniCorp? What are they?"
"OmniCorp International is a multinational conglomerate. Publicly, they are a leader in consumer electronics, renewable energy, and pharmaceuticals. My deeper analysis, however, indicates their primary revenue and research is in advanced materials science, genetic engineering, and private security. They have seventy-four active lawsuits regarding industrial espionage and sixteen ongoing investigations by world governments for unethical experimentation, though nothing has ever been proven. They possess capabilities approximately fifteen years ahead of public sector technology."
Arjun stood up, pacing the room on his newly powerful legs. His enhanced mind, now working at a fever pitch thanks to the cumulative upgrades, connected the dots instantly.
"The lightning strike. They detected it. They're looking for the source."
"A logical conclusion. The energy signature was unique. My analysis suggests they have narrowed the source down to a five-square-kilometer area. This neighborhood is within that area."
He stopped pacing. They were close. A corporation with near-unlimited resources and a blatant disregard for ethics was sniffing around his doorstep. The hammer and knife sales were likely still beneath their notice, but it was only a matter of time before his activities created another anomaly they could trace.
His feeling of invincibility evaporated, replaced by a sharp, clarifying fear. Upgrading his stats was not enough. He needed active abilities. Defenses.
He pulled up his Status again. His physical stats were now all sitting at a respectable 7 or 8—well above average. But his attention was seized by the Talents section. The greyed-out option was now accessible. His SP had regenerated to exactly 100.
Minor Regeneration (Passive). Cost: 100 SP. Allows the user's body to heal minor wounds and recover from fatigue at an accelerated rate.
It was everything. The ultimate insurance policy. The ability to walk off a knife wound, to recover from a beating, to never be laid low by injury.
"Gyan, I'm doing it. I'm taking the Regeneration talent."
"Biometrics stable. Proceed."
He didn't hesitate. Acquire Talent: Minor Regeneration.
["Purchasing Talent: Minor Regeneration. Cost: 100 SP. Proceed? Y/N"]
Y.
His entire store of energy, every last SP point, drained away to zero.
The sensation was completely different from the attribute upgrades. It wasn't a jolt or a burn. It was a deep, cellular unlocking. It felt like a million tiny, invisible switches flipping on throughout his body. A warm, soothing hum settled deep in his bones, a constant, reassuring background signal of life and repair. A small cut on his finger from earlier, which he hadn't even noticed, closed up and vanished before his eyes, leaving behind unblemished skin.
He felt… durable. Resilient. He was no longer just strong and healthy; he was hard to break.
But the cost had been immense. He was back to zero, defenseless in terms of system power. And he was now acutely aware that a corporate titan was hunting for him.
He needed intelligence. He needed to see the enemy.
"Gyan, OmniCorp. I want to see them. Find me everything you can. Blueprints of their local facilities. Employee dossiers. Security protocols. I don't care how deep you have to go. Don't engage. Just observe."
"Acknowledged. Initiating deep-level infiltration of OmniCorp's 'Astra' server network. Deploying multi-layered decoy algorithms to mask this probe."
The main holographic display dissolved into a mesmerizing, terrifying river of data. Firewalls were depicted as glowing red walls that Gyan's code flowed around like water. Encryption was represented as complex, shifting locks that were picked open in milliseconds. It was a digital ballet of espionage happening in real-time above his coffee table.
Files began to populate the display. Architectural plans for a nondescript office building on the outskirts of Lucknow that hid a ten-story subterranean lab. Employee IDs. Security shift logs.
And then, a file tagged PROJECT: PROMETHEUS.
It was protected by an encryption that made all the others look like child's play. Gyan's progress slowed.
"This encryption is quantum-level. Breaching it will require significant processing power and will create a detectable anomaly in their network. Risk of counter-intrusion protocols activating is high. Proceed?"
Arjun's new, heightened instincts screamed no. This was a trapdoor. But the name… Prometheus. The being who stole fire from the gods and gave it to humanity. What had OmniCorp stolen?
"Can you do it without them tracing it back to us?"
"I can breach it for approximately 0.7 seconds—long enough to copy the file—and route the access request through a series of compromised satellites, making the origin point appear to be a research station in Antarctica. The probability of successful obfuscation is 82.3%."
It was a risk. A big one. But knowledge was power. And he needed power.
"Do it."
"Breaching… NOW."
The data stream on the hologram became a blinding, frantic torrent of light. For a fraction of a second, it looked like a chaotic storm. Then, a single file icon—a stylized flame—zoomed into the center of the display before the entire view snapped back to its normal, calm state.
"File acquired. Counter-intrusion protocols were activated but successfully misdirected to the Antarctic proxy. We remain undetected."
Arjun let out a shaky breath. "Open it. Project Prometheus."
The file unfolded. It wasn't a text document. It was a video log. The timestamp was three weeks old. The setting was a sterile, white laboratory.
A scientist in a biosafety suit was speaking to the camera, his voice buzzing with excitement. "...subject Gamma-Seven continues to exhibit sustained metabolic enhancement after the third injection. The synthesized compound, derived from the energy signatures of the 'Vishnu' event last year, is stable. We are now ready to begin human trials. The potential is limitless: soldiers who can heal from gunshot wounds in hours, astronauts who can withstand extreme radiation…"
The camera panned to a large, transparent cylinder. Inside, a white rabbit was frantically scrambling against the walls. A technician injected a glowing, blue-serum into its leg.
For a moment, nothing happened. Then, the rabbit began to change. Its muscles visibly swelled, tearing against its skin. Its eyes glowed with a feral, blue light. It started beating itself against the wall of the cylinder with terrifying force, over and over, until its skull fractured. It kept beating, long after it should have been dead, driven by a horrific, relentless energy.
The scientist's excited narration turned to panic. "Shut it down! Administer the suppressant! The regenerative properties are causing uncontrolled cellular mitosis! It's not healing, it's… consuming itself!"
The video ended abruptly.
Arjun sat in stunned, horrified silence. They weren't just a corporation. They were playing with forces they didn't understand, creating monstrous, unstable powers. And they were doing it with energy signatures similar to the one that had created him.
The Minor Regeneration talent hummed softly within him, a perfect, stable, and controlled version of the horrific power OmniCorp was trying to force into existence.
He had just wanted to be free from poverty. But his freedom had placed him directly in the path of a goliath that wanted to dissect him, reverse-engineer him, and turn his power into a weapon.
The architecture of his new life was being built, but its foundation was now shaking. He was no longer just building a fortune.
He was preparing for a war he never asked for.